Living as we do, within living memory of the Holocaust, we’ve heard plenty of tales of immeasurable suffering as well as the stories of the unique individuals—Jewish and non-Jewish—who risked their very lives to save others, sometimes succeeding and other times failing to accomplish nearly as much as they’d wished.
Among the constellation of such bright stars, Recha Sternbuch stands out for her bravery, ingenuity, faith, and insatiable desire to save as many lives as she possibly could.
A deeply religious Jewish mother, she fed and sheltered numerous refugees in her own home in Switzerland—but that was just a tiny part of her outsized efforts to save lives.
As the storm clouds darkened over European Jewry, she selflessly devoted herself to rescue efforts that were not so typical of an Orthodox woman, such as illegal smuggling of refugees, bribery of foreign diplomats, and negotiations with the Nazis. Thousands of Holocaust survivors owe their lives to Recha’s courage, ingenuity, and tenacity.
Born in Poland in 1905, Recha was the fifth child of Rabbi Mordechai and Sara Hendel Rottenberg. When she was 7, her family moved to Antwerp, Belgium, where her father served as the Chief Rabbi. In Antwerp, the Rottenberg home was always open to visitors, whether traveling scholars or the local poor. The rabbi and rebbetzin offered a listening ear, empathy, and advice, as well as food and shelter.
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| Rabbi Mordechai Rottenberg of Antwerp, Belgium, Recha's father (Rjcedit, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons) |
Recha was raised with these values, and taking care of others was natural to her. When she was 23 years old and still single, her aunt died suddenly, leaving behind a four-year-old daughter. Recha decided to adopt the little girl. Her condition for any potential marriage offer was that her future husband would raise the girl as his own.
Isaac Sternbuch of St. Gallen, Switzerland, was not deterred by the unusual condition. When he met Recha, he found that they had much in common. Like the Rottenbergs, the Sternbuchs maintained an open home, with many guests staying for months at a time.
After their wedding, Recha and Isaac settled in St. Gallen, where Isaac worked in his father’s textile business and made a comfortable living. Soon, they too became known for their open home and hospitality and kindness to others, whether neighbors or perfect strangers. Whenever a woman in the community gave birth, Recha would be the first to go and help out. She got involved in local charitable projects while raising her growing family.
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| View of St. Gallen, Switzerland. (albinfo, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons) |
Influx of Jewish Refugees
As conditions deteriorated for German Jews after Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, more and more Jews attempted to emigrate. Though Switzerland was not interested in sheltering a large number of Jewish refugees, between 1933 and 1937 over 5,000 German Jews managed to enter the country after local Jewish organizations committed to taking care of them.
The Sternbuchs immediately stepped in, offering food and shelter. One of the refugees, Zecharia Reinhold, recalls, “When I came in, there were tables surrounded with people as if at simcha [a festive occasion] where they ate and drank … It was an open house … people coming and going all day …The floors of the house were covered with mattresses for the people … There were all kinds, [religious and secular] … she helped everyone.”1
There was some conflict between the religious, who wanted to pray together and observe all Jewish holidays properly, and the secular, who preferred to keep quiet and avoid the neighbors’ attention. The Sternbuchs resolved the conflict by establishing a daily minyan. Reinhold recalls the non-Jewish neighbors staring at the religious Jews, clad in white, on Yom Kippur. But soon those same non-Jewish neighbors warmed up to the refugees and even helped them cut down tree branches for Sukkot.
Smuggling Refugees Over the Border
After the 1938 Anschluss, when Germany annexed Austria, Jews in Austria found themselves in immediate danger. Tens of thousands attempted to escape, some illegally crossing the border into Switzerland.
The Swiss government tried to stop the flow of illegal refugees. Anyone caught by the Swiss border patrol was turned over to the Nazi police, with exceptions made for children, the elderly, and the sick.
Living in close proximity to the Austrian border, Recha could not sit by idly while thousands of her brethren faced what she sensed was mortal danger. She mobilized her community to establish a network of smugglers who would ferry Austrian Jews into Switzerland safely. Both Jews and non-Jews, moved by Recha’s heartfelt pleas, joined her in her rescue work.
Recha herself often drove to the border to pick up refugees, greeting them with a smile, assuaging their fears, and taking them to her home in St. Gallen. She was willing to risk her own freedom and, at times, her life, to save others.
Even her own children often did not know the extent of her rescue activities. Legends abound about Recha crossing the border, marching straight into the Nazi police headquarters, and demanding, as an influential Swiss citizen, the release of Jews captured at the border. But Recha never spoke about it, not even after the war.
Among her helpers was Captain Paul Grüninger, a non-Jewish police commander in St. Gallen, who also met refugees at the border and drove them to safety. One of the refugees, Hilde Weinreb, recalls, “We sneaked out of our hiding place and warily approached the border … There was deathly silence, except for the noise our feet made in the mud and the beating of our hearts. Suddenly a man in uniform appeared out of nowhere. He held a [flashlight] in his hand, shining the light into our faces. We must have looked ashen and were convinced that this was the end. But the man greeted us with a kind smile on his face.”2
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| Memorial plaque to Paul Grüninger in Petach Tikva, Israel. (Avi1111 dr. avishai teicher, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons) |
Additionally, in his capacity as a police commander, Grüninger assisted 3,600 refugees in obtaining falsified documents, which enabled them to remain in Switzerland. Unfortunately, in March 1939, Grüninger’s illegal activities were discovered, and he was fired from his job, put on trial, and found guilty of “breach of duty.” But he never regretted his rescue activities. Later, he stated, “It was basically a question of saving human lives threatened with death. How could I then seriously consider bureaucratic schemes and calculations?”3 The refugees Grueninger rescued are forever indebted to him. Yad Vashem recognized him as Righteous Among the Nations.
Once in Switzerland, the refugees were out of danger, but they had no means of sustenance and no legal permission to work. The Sternbuchs generously provided for as many refugees as they could, but they knew that a long-term solution was needed. Switzerland could serve as a safe stop along the way, but not the final destination.
Recha searched high and low for ways to obtain visas for the refugees to enter other countries. She bribed representatives of foreign embassies, who supplied her with a significant amount of visas for a high price, which the Sternbuchs paid out of their own pockets.
Arrest and Trial
In May 1939, Recha was arrested by the Swiss police and accused of a long list of crimes, chief among them illegal smuggling of refugees and bribing diplomatic officials. The authorities made it clear to her that if she revealed her collaborators, her punishment would be much less severe.
In response, Recha wrote to the prosecuting attorney:
I always believed that when innocent persecuted people ask me for help and nobody suffers a loss through my help, that only I will be punished. I will gladly choose to be punished because if one has seen the mental and physical exhaustion of these people when they come from the border, one would prefer, with satisfaction, to endure punishment rather than to send them back …
I don’t want anybody to cover up my actions or try to cast them in such a light that I would escape punishment … Your demand however … that I should denounce human beings that haven’t harmed anyone, and for the most part are poor, decent workers who could not bear to suffer punishment, be it financial or a loss of their employment for a few months, bringing extreme hardship to their wives and children, this I cannot do. Do you really expect me to denounce the fathers of these families and bring them misfortune?4
At the trial, Recha admitted to smuggling refugees but again refused to implicate anyone else. She also admitted to bribery and justified her actions:
Conditions today are unfortunately such that many times it appears impossible, or is in fact impossible, to obtain a visa in a legal manner and for payment of the regular taxes … Many times there is no choice but to resort to the rather unpleasant means of bribing a consular official. I personally consider this completely against my convictions but conditions actually force me to resort to these means.5
Thankfully, the judge was sympathetic. He dismissed all charges upon “lack of evidence.” After the trial, he summoned Recha to his chambers and handed her an envelope containing 100 francs – his contribution to her rescue mission.
Relief Efforts
In 1940, Recha, Isaac, and their three children moved to Montreaux, at the foot of the Swiss Alps, in order to send their oldest son to a yeshivah there. Recha was no longer living close to the border, but she continued helping her fellow Jews in other ways.
By that time, the Nazis had conquered Poland and begun concentrating Jews in ghettos. News of the terrible conditions of Polish Jews began to reach the Sternbuchs, and they were determined to help.
Recha met with Julius Kühl, a Polish Jew who served as the assistant to the Polish ambassador in Switzerland. Kühl, in turn, introduced Recha to the ambassador himself, Alexander Lados. The ambassador was not Jewish, but he listened to Recha’s pleas and promised to help.
With the ambassador’s assistance, Recha began sending relief packages containing food and medicine to Polish Jews. In the overcrowded and disease-ridden ghettos, these packages were lifesaving.
In addition, Recha searched for a way to provide foreign visas to Polish Jews. Again, the Sternbuchs spent their own money to bribe diplomatic officials, thus saving lives.
As the plight of Eastern European Jews worsened, and the Sternbuchs realized that their own resources were running low, Recha founded a relief organization that later became known as HIJEFS. Its original goal was to assist the Jews stranded in Shanghai, but later, the Sternbuchs were able to assist desperate Jews in other locations as well. For the first time, Recha took upon herself the thankless task of fundraising, traveling all over Switzerland to collect relief funds.
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| View of Montreaux, Switzerland. C. 1900. |
Diplomatic Efforts
As Recha concentrated on her relief efforts, she could not even fathom the fate that the Nazis had in mind for all Jews under their occupation. It wasn’t until September 1942 that Isaac’s brother, Eli, an active participant in the rescue and relief efforts, received a coded letter with horrifying news.
The Sternbuchs understood the urgency and immediately contacted the Polish embassy, which offered them the use of their diplomatic pouch. Through it, the Sternbuchs sent a telegram to their contacts in America, informing the U.S. Jewish community of the Nazi “final solution.” Their efforts galvanized the American Jews into action. The Rabbis’ March on Washington and the pressure on President Roosevelt led to the creation of the War Refugee Board (WRB), tasked with the “immediate rescue and relief of the Jews of Europe and other victims of enemy persecution.”6
To the Sternbuchs’ immense frustration, the American rescue efforts were moving very slowly while millions of Jews were being murdered in Eastern Europe. As Recha searched desperately for another way to help, she reached out to an unlikely ally – Jean-Marie Musy, the former Swiss president.
A deeply religious Christian, Musy was appalled by the persecution of religion in the Soviet Union and took a harsh stance against Communism. In the early 1930s, during his presidency, this position was in alignment with Germany’s Nazi Party’s radical anti-Communist views. It was due to this common cause that he had visited Germany in 1937 and met with the Holocaust architect, Heinrich Himmler.
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| Jean-Marie Musy |
Musy did not feel any particular love for Jews and might have held antisemitic views in his youth. But now, in his seventies, he was deeply distressed by the news coming out of eastern Europe and made a decision to stand on the right side of history. Using his personal connections, he intervened with the Nazis and managed to free a Jewish couple, relatives of his long-time law practice clients in Switzerland.
Recha heard about this incident and pleaded with Musy to rescue more Jews from Nazi clutches. Moved by her pleas, Musy agreed to help and went above and beyond what Recha originally had in mind.
Risking their own lives, Musy and his son Benoit drove to Germany, which by then, in autumn 1944, was under constant bombardment by the Allies. Musy met with Himmler and began the long and drawn-out negotiations for the “humanitarian gesture” of freeing all remaining Jews under Nazi occupation. Of course, Himmler was not expected to do this for free.
At this point, Germany was losing the war. Himmler had his own interest in conducting these negotiations. He hoped to conclude a separate peace deal with the Western Allies, excluding the Soviet Union, and to eventually succeed Hitler after Germany’s surrender. Musy managed to convince him that any talks with the West would require putting a stop to the atrocities being perpetrated against the Jews. In November 1944, Himmler ordered the destruction of the gas chambers and crematoria in Auschwitz. The “Final Solution” was finally coming to an end.
However, the Jews in Europe, held in horrible conditions in concentration camps, were not yet out of danger. Musy traveled to Germany again and again. In February 1945, he brought Recha’s two brothers back to Switzerland with him. They were handed over as part of the negotiations. Sadly, Recha’s parents were no longer alive by then.
During that trip, Musy and Himmler signed an agreement, according to which Germany would release a trainload of Jews – 1,200 people per trip – every two weeks.
On February 6th, the first train of Jews formerly held at Theresienstadt arrived in Switzerland. Musy intervened with the Swiss authorities to allow the refugees into the country and personally met them at the train station.
Thrilled at Musy’s success, the Sternbuchs eagerly awaited the next train. Unfortunately, it never came. Hitler, who found out about Himmler’s agreement with Musy, was furious. He declared Himmler a traitor and put a stop to releasing Jews.
Recha was not aware of these developments. When she saw that the second train was not coming, she told Musy that she would personally accompany him to Germany to meet with Himmler. She was willing to do anything, including putting herself in grave danger, if it would help rescue more Jews. Her husband, however, objected to Recha entering the lion’s den.
As soon as Germany surrendered in May 1945, Recha traveled to Germany, delivering kosher relief packages to survivors of concentration camps. Then she traveled to France, where she founded an orphanage and a yeshivah for child survivors. She also searched for Jewish orphans in monasteries and placed them in Jewish homes or institutions.
Recha Sternbuch passed away in Paris in 1971. Though thousands of Jews credit Recha with their survival, till her last breath she had regretted not doing more to save her brethren.
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| Recha and Isaac Sternbuch at a meeting in Montreux, 1946 (Marina Widmer/Heidi Witzig) |
Sources:
Max Wallace. In the Name of Humanity: The Secret Deal to End the Holocaust. Skyhorse Publishing, 2018.
David Kranzler, Eliezer Gevirtz. To Save a World: Profiles in Holocaust Rescue. CIS Publishers, 1991.
David Kranzler. Thy Brothers’ Blood: The Orthodox Jewish Response During the Holocaust. Mesorah Publications, 1987.
